SO when did you last spend hours on the phone on a bank holiday trying to find a medieval historian? Or, come to that, an English graduate, or anyone with a degree in something such as gender studies, philosophy or sports science?

But a plumber. Ah, that's a different story.

We all need plumbers. They are worth their weight in gold. Especially when water is pouring through the bathroom ceiling or the loo is doing unspeakable things all over the floor.

When that happens, we don't need someone who can tell us the chemical composition of water, its etymological derivation, or write a press release about it. What we want is someone who can stop the leak, fast.

So why do we rate graduates higher than plumbers?

Britain needs more plumbers and fewer media studies graduates, the Institute of Directors said this week. They want the Government to stop pushing more and more young people into university and, instead, wants more of them out in the work place learning a trade. Meanwhile the Institute of Plumbing has estimated that we'll need 29,000 new plumbers in the next five years. Currently there are around 800 in training.

Which will mean an awful lot of dripping taps and leaky loos.

As well as plumbers, they want builders and bricklayers, joiners and electricians. Quite right.

The worth of a good builder is above rubies. Hard enough to find an average sort of builder. Find a great one and nothing is too good for him.

Even the multi-million-pound showpiece Baltic centre has got buckets out this week to catch the drips. So what hope for the rest of us?

Yet there is still some stupid snobbery attached to trades and crafts. Goodness knows why. Anything with an 'ology, as Maureen Lipman used to say, is considered much more worthwhile that any thing that might - perish the thought - actually be useful.

Apprenticeships largely belong to history - along with the skills, crafts and discipline they instilled. Having a trade was once something to be proud of. Now, it seems, it's something to apologise for. Unless, of course, you make furniture and are the Queen's nephew.

The Institute of Directors would like 14 year olds who don't want to go to university to be given the chance to study "vocational skills" - another way of saying "something useful". It also wants the government to scrap its plans for 50 per cent of school leavers to go to university.

And next time there's water pouring through your ceiling, you might just agree with them.

KEEPING your children amused over the next six weeks could cost around £3,000 says a new survey.

If you can't afford that, then be thankful. You are very lucky and your children are extremely privileged.

The £3,000 - which doesn't allow for the cost of ice creams and outings - is apparently the cost of six weeks of day care, play care, summer schemes to stop children getting bored.

Well, children SHOULD get bored occasionally. That is - or should be - part of growing up. It's called learning to amuse yourself, which is part of learning to think for yourself.

And you don't do that if some adult is constantly there to entertain you. There are - as any primary teacher will tell you - an amazing number of children these days who don't know how to play. They have simply never been left to themselves to get on with it, which is a tragedy.

Children playing by themselves develop their imagination and self-reliance. With other children they learn how to get on with people, to work together. Their lives are the richer for it.

Of course, it's nice to give your children trips and treats. But they also need time to themselves, to develop their own resources. They might play endlessly with Lego, make dolls' clothes, devise puzzles, write stories. They might just tease their little sister, drive you up the wall or lie staring blankly at the ceiling. But eventually they'll do something useful - and it's even more constructive if they've though of it themselves.

And let them get used to entertaining themselves from the earliest age possible. Before it's too late.

A young mother was interviewed in the papers this week. Pregnant at 11years old, she'd had her baby at 12 and now, at 13, comes home from school straight into childcare.

"I don't really mind, "she says "It gives me something to do."

There are better ways of relieving boredom - and the sooner children discover them for themselves, the better.

HOLIDAY brochures aimed at young British people feature naked couples, foam parties, strip karaoke and serious drinking competitions.

And we wonder why we're some of the most unpopular tourists in the world...

Planning a wedding? At Debenhams in Sunderland tomorrow evening there's a Bridal Night and Fashion Show with ideas for wedding dresses, mother of the bride outfits, men's formal wear, everything. Hair stylists and cosmetic consultants will be on hand too - and Ann Watson, Debenham's splendid personal shopper.

Free entry, prize draw, goodie bags. The event takes place in the store's restaurant from 7.30-9.30pm.

EARL Spencer has been having his annual go at the royal family again, dragging up old bitterness about the way they treated his sister and her memory.

Strange, isn't it, how these outbursts always come just in time to remind people that his stately home is open for the summer?

Published: ??/??/2002